Abstract
Gender inequalities and deeply rooted gender stereotypes create enormous challenges for women in working life. Female academics in Turkey face these challenges and try to overcome them. The current study focused on female leaders' experiences in academia about these challenges. The findings showed that in order to survive in the male dominant working life, some female academics establish sisterhood with other women and enjoy solidarity behaviors, and others try to cope with the hardships via showing crab and queen bee behaviors. Thus, the study presents a portrayal of these three metaphors, queen bee, sisterhood, and crabs in a barrel in academic circles in the country.
TopIntroduction And Background
Calls for female solidarity behavior in workplace settings are increasing in management studies (Mavin, 2008). The fundamental reason for these calls is the belief that female leaders have an important role in supporting and leading other women through managerial positions. What lies behind these behaviors that are called sisterhood / solidarity is the assumption that women are natural allies.
Sisterhood and solidarity behaviors assume that women see other women as allies regardless of the hierarchical differences and that women in top management accept other women as their responsibility. Kanter (1977) defines the activities that constitute the basis of female solidarity behavior in organizations and states that members of minority groups in organizations can be allies, can form coalitions, can influence the culture of the group and develop support networks that increase each other’s chances of improving careers. Similarly, Korabik & Abbondanza (2004) define female solidarity behavior as forming alliances, cooperating, rallying for common purposes, creating commitments to change social structures through collective managerial practices and as behaviors that reflect loyalty and gender consciousness. Solidarity behaviors also involve expectations of support and harmony among women (Mavin, 2008). Korabik & Abbondanza (2004) emphasize that women who act as tools of societal change should adopt solidarity behavior.
Sisterhood / solidarity behaviors claim that women will keep themselves aligned with other women and support each other. In this regard, proactive and visible senior women who hold top positions should be encouraged to share their experiences as mentors and role models. So, experienced women are advised to improve, support and cooperate with other women to improve their professional status. The tendency of female managers to support other women in their careers, namely sisterhood and solidarity behaviors, has been subject to a limited number of studies. Legge (1987) claims that women do not use their potential power in organizations and as a result they cannot form alliances with other women whom they are natural allies with. According to Hit (2005) there is a hidden competition between women which hinders their cooperation. Indeed, finding a top management position and staying there is competitive in its nature. As the established order in top management is patriarchal, women’s presence there destabilize the existing structure. If the peer group of a female top manager consists of senior males, it would be very hard for her not to develop adaptive behaviors (Bryans & Mavin, 2003). Thus, especially women who hold leadership positions where male dominance exists sometimes distance themselves from their female colleagues and as a result they are blamed for not showing solidarity behaviors (Sheppard & Aquino, 2013).
Sheppard & Aquino (2017), state that in male dominant professions women have a tendency to compete with their female peers because of the scarce resources. According to them, women generally have more competition among each other compared to men and women have a tendency to obstruct other women’s success (Sheppard & Aquino, 2013). Individuals perceive others of the same gender with them as similars rather than those of the other gender, as they typically have similar positions in similar organizations. Thus, they are more appropriate targets for comparison and may cause jealousy (Duffy et al., 2012). This is why when organizational resources and opportunities seem to be less accessible and more scarce, women’s competition with other women and hostile behaviors towards each other may increase (Derks et al., 2016) and interpersonal relationships between women may become tense.
Many organizations find it challenging to make sure that women are fairly represented in top management positions. Most of the time it is assumed that having females in top positions will make other women’s ways into similar positions easy, but this assumption is controversial.
Key Terms in this Chapter
Female Leadership: Female presence in managerial and leadership roles in organizations.
Gender Inequalities: People being not treated equally based on gender.
Social Identity Theory: This theory studies the interaction between an individual’s personal and social identities. The theory provides an understanding of individual’s intergroup behavior and communication.
Queen Bee Behaviors: Female leaders’ self-group distancing behavior. These female leaders not only distance themselves from other women in the organization but also focus on their differences from other women, legitimize the gender unequal status quo and present themselves with rather masculine characteristics.
Solidarity Behaviors: Solidarity is two people being psychologically close, trusting each other and having harmony in their relationship. Solidarity behaviors are those behaviors that lead to a rapport between two people.
Sisterhood Behaviors: Supportive behaviors between female members of an organization which aim to empower, help, and assist other females in work related contexts.
Crabs in a Barrel Behaviors: Negative behaviors towards another group member which aims to promote one’s own success and/or prevent other’s success and accomplishment.